Animals with bad design.

Very funny Doctor. But let me provide an alternate ending: Boss: OK, the floor's yours. Please explain in what way Jenkins' design is intelligent. Creationist: Well Jenkins original design was a 747, Sir. Boss: "Was"? Creationist: Yes, Sir. Beautiful machine. Breathtaking. Perfect. Boss: So what happened? Creationist: Well, Jenkins had a fairly major falling out with the Company, Sir... Boss: How major? Creationist: Well...we sort of collaborated with our main competitor... behind his back... Boss: Infernal Enterprises? Why on earth would we do that? Creationist: (Evasive, sheepish) Oh...you know...better pay...fancier sounding titles... Boss: So how on earth did Jenkins react? Creationist: Not very well at all, sir. He built degenerative mechanisms into all his inventions. We call them "mutations"(nervous laugh). The longer the machines operate, the more the "mutations" break them down, and we have to keep assigning more and more basic functions to them... Boss: You mean, his 747... Creationist: Yes Sir. His beautiful, beautiful 747... Boss: Is now a lawnmower??? Creationist: Yes Sir- but what a lawnmower...! Boss: (Sighs, and then murmurs) Why does it still have wings? Creationist: Oh Sir- do you know what it would cost to get rid of them? Makes far more economic sense to just leave them where they are. I mean, they still look pretty. And some engineers are saying that they even might even improve cooling to the engine. Typical of Jenkins. He could never be completely destructive. Not in his nature...Edited by Kaichos Man, : SpacingEdited by Kaichos Man, : formatEdited by Kaichos Man, : format

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"When man loses God, he does not believe in nothing. He believes in anything" G.K. Chesterton

The horse was originally (according to evolutionary folklore) a small creature with a fully articulated spine and five toes on each foot. It now has one toe on each foot, a fixed spine (not capable of sideways movement) and is much bigger due to a mutation to a growth-control gene.An impressive creature, but it is what it is today due to a succession of deleterious mutations.Oh, and it eats grass. There's your lawnmower.

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"When man loses God, he does not believe in nothing. He believes in anything" G.K. Chesterton

Where the "evolutionary process" is deleterious mutation, and the form or function is "new" only in the sense of being different, and not additional to. I don't have a problem in believing that a species can "devolve" through loss of information and retain vestigial features, while still remaining within the Biblical "kind".I imagine the original cat to have been an incredible creature, with its multi-coloured fur, stripes, spots and sabre-teeth. Subsequent deleterious mutations would have resulted in the diverse feline kingdom we have today; the loss of retractable claws resulted in the cheetah, for example.It is good to see that this phenomenon is finally being acknowledged by mainstream science. This from New Scientist:"The idea of loss in evolution is not new. We know that snakes lost their legs, as did whales, and that our own ancestors lost body hair. However, the latest evidence suggests that the extent of loss might have been seriously underestimated. Some evolutionary biologists now suggest that loss - at every level, from genes and types of cells to whole anatomical features and life stages - is the key to understanding evolution and the relatedness of living things. Proponents of this idea argue that classical phylogeny has been built on rotten foundations, and tinkering with it will not put it right. Instead, they say, we need to rethink the process of evolution itself.Laura Spinney, New Scientist. Full articleEvolution: hacking back the tree of life (can anyone say DEVOLUTION?)The point is, Doctor, that Creationists believe in a lot more of the ToE than you realise. It is only the increase in complexity that we don't believe in, and molecular research is increasingly supporting our position, as evidenced above.

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"When man loses God, he does not believe in nothing. He believes in anything" G.K. Chesterton

All of the extant skulls can be easily categorised as either human or ape, within the normal range of species variation. As for the so-called progression:"The vast majority of artist's conceptions are based more on imagination than on evidence..Artists must create something between an ape and a human being; the older the specimen is said to be, the more ape-like they make it." - "Anthro Art", Science Digest April 1981 pg 41.

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"When man loses God, he does not believe in nothing. He believes in anything" G.K. Chesterton

No idea. However, according to WP:Normal cats have a total of 18 toes, with five toes on each front paw and four toes on each hind paw; polydactyl cats may have as many as seven digits on its front and/or hind paws.Does having more toes represent an increase in information? Is a two-headed snake a more complex creature? I tend to regard the flexibility in feline toe-number as a genetic weakness. I certainly don't see it as a banner of hope for the ToE. (Pun not intended)

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"When man loses God, he does not believe in nothing. He believes in anything" G.K. Chesterton

Whyever not? Inbuilt reducing versatility to cater for a range of different environmental conditions? That's brilliant design! Regard the "you-got-an-environment-we-got-a-phenotype" foramanifera. Exquisite design, way beyond the reach of dumb, blind copying mistakes.

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"When man loses God, he does not believe in nothing. He believes in anything" G.K. Chesterton

Not enjoyed by the cheetah- it's the only member of the cat family that can't. Enjoyed only by the cheetah. This is a very simple proposition, Doctor. A leopard, through deleterious mutation, lost the ability to retract its claws. Those claws became blunt and dog-like. The individuals carrying the mutation, unable to climb trees, had to rely on their speed over the ground. The fastest survived -natural selection- and the cheetah was born.Very straightforward speciation through loss of genetic information. Absolutely right. I shall, from now on, try to express my views as precisely that, and not the views of Creationists in general. No, it goes further than that. Read it. It suggests that loss of information has played a far greater role in evolution than formerly supposed. My contention, that loss of information is the only form of evolution, is my own view. I don't suggest that the evidence presented leads naturally to that conclusion, only in that direction.

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"When man loses God, he does not believe in nothing. He believes in anything" G.K. Chesterton

Look at my reply to Dr Adequate above, Bluescat.To believe that the cat evolved retractable claws, you have to believe the following:That cats, through copying mistakes, gained sharp-ended claws, tendons, tendon sheaths, and retractory muscles in their legs. Each copying mistake took the form of an enormously complex genetic architecture to create those structures. Each structure, though absolutely useless on its own, conveyed a survival advantage on the mutants that caused them to survive while all other members of the population died out. It goes something like this:A cat, through a random mutation, gains extra muscles in its leg. All other members of the population die out. Why?The cat mutates tendons attached to the muscles. All other members of the population die out. Why?The cat mutates tendon sheaths to protect the tendons. Without them, the friction between bare tendon and muscle would create irritation, infection and death. Kind of hard to understand how the previous generations survived, but hey. All non-mutants (hardly surprisingly) die out.The cat finally mutates sharp claws. Well done. We now have a genuine, believable, survival advantage. What a shame that the first three stages defy all logic.You know, and I know, that the first three stages don't make sense. This is Irreducible Complexity, and it can no more create retractable claws than it can create avian lungs, or eyes or ears or brains or echo-location organs.The cheetah evolved from the leopard through a simple loss of genetic information. It's simple, logical and believable. I would even suggest that most evolutionists believe this.The opposite -leopard evolving from cheetah- is a perfect illustration of the logic-denying idiocy of neo-Darwinian fundamentalists.Edited by Kaichos Man, : further info

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"When man loses God, he does not believe in nothing. He believes in anything" G.K. Chesterton